VLOG | E19 | Coronavirus, our fear response, and how we'll get through it

The whole world is dealing with the coronavirus pandemic, and the first thing I want to emphasize is that everybody’s natural, normal, healthy fear response is elevated.

The point is there’s nothing wrong with you to feel the way you do, and we are all in that together. That means staying home, getting treatment if we need it, taking care of each other, and eventually solving this problem.

There are many things you can do to reduce your fear response/anxiety: mutually caring relationships; diet, exercise, and sleep; and programs like mindfulness-based stress reduction.

One of my bigger concerns is generalized anxiety, how that certainly may be worse, and how best to treat that. One of the first and easiest solutions to that right now is medication, and I will tell you why.

Finally, we need hope. This comes in the form of eventually a vaccination, but before that we need Testing, Tracking, and Treating --- which will help us resume a somewhat normal life until then.

VLOG | E18 | All emotions are good, some are better

At the conclusion of this initial section on primary emotions, it’s important to summarize the major points I have made so far.

In addition to describing each of the primary emotions, or joy, anger, fear, and sadness, I've also explored other aspects of understanding our emotions. Like the feeling of emotions in our body, the purpose of our emotions, we feel what we believe, and that emotions are like sensory responses.

The final and probably most difficult discovery to make is that all emotions are good, and some are better.

We typically talk about either positive emotions or negative emotions, or that joy is the positive emotion, and that anger, fear, and sadness are the negative emotions. That’s understandable because joy is certainly better as an experience than the other three. It is designed to be that way. Or that we pursue a life that causes the joy response as much as possible.

But in discovering that all emotions are equally important to living and surviving, they are ALL good for us, or every emotional response is actually not only good for us, but essential.

Conceptually speaking, that's relatively easy to know and understand. What’s harder, and what I’m asking you to look at now, is that when you feel what we typically call a negative emotion, know it and feel it as a positive experience.

Or, when you feel fear, that’s a good thing. When you feel sadness, that’s a good thing. When you feel anger, that’s also a good thing. We are not used to thinking and therefore feeling that way about each of these emotional responses.

This is especially powerful when managing these emotions, both internally and externally. We can eliminate feeling fear about fear. We can eliminate feeling sadness about sadness. And we can eliminate feeling anger about anger.

I will have many more episodes that describe exactly how to manage all of your emotions when you have them.

Finally, the understanding that all emotions are good is remarkably helpful in understanding and dealing with mental health conditions like anxiety and depression. This new understanding, this cognitive shift, is incredibly powerful to rid ourselves of those experiences, and of those clinical diagnosis.

That’s a big deal — actually that’s a huge deal. When you do this, by the way, it’s like having a super power. And that is really good.

VLOG | E17 | The feelings of emotions in our body

It is especially important to know how we feel our emotions in our body. And it’s important to know that it’s true for all of our primary emotions, or categories of joy, anger, fear, and sadness.

Something that’s very important in the treatment of anxiety is understanding how our body feels emotions. And when you put that together with understanding the feeling of ALL emotions, it makes more sense.

For instance, we feel joy in the presence of someone wonderful to us — we feel a glow, a warmth, a rush, a buzz. The feeling in our body tells us how important they are to us, and how much we want to spend time with them.

When we are really angry, we feel that in our body, as well. It’s an intensity, a power, a guttural feeling of fight. It tells us we’re under attack, and it gives us the kind of superpower we need to fight off the attacker.

As I said, this is very important to understanding anxiety, as the fear response is another powerful feeling in our body. It typically wants to make us run, or to take flight, to get out of there. And it can go right to our stomach, as we all know, and we call that butterflies, or more than that.

Both the fear and anger responses are so important to feel physically because our body needs whatever extra juice required to deal with the situation, to run from the attacker, or to fight it, in its most primitive and important sense.

Finally, sadness can be felt deeply in the body, as well. The feeling of emptiness, of extreme loss, of everything leaving the body when we feel a great sadness. We all know it when someone we love dies, or they leave us, as we feel it physically. People who feel depression, or elevated, persistent sadness, know that all too well, and daily.

The point is we really need to know how much we feel our emotions in our bodies, and especially when they rise to the levels that require action, understanding, or change. When we experience higher levels of joy, anger, fear, and sadness, our body tells us what’s going on, as well.

VLOG | E16 | We FEEL what we BELIEVE

Following up on the purpose of emotions and that we are always feeling something, we feel what we believe.

By that I mean because emotional responses are like sensory responses, we feel what we are perceiving, what we know around us, or what we’re processing cognitively before it happens emotionally. All of this happens in an instant, and we're typically not consciously aware of it.

One of the best examples is someone pointing at gun at our head. We’re walking down a road or a street, when some stranger pops out and points a gun at our head, and we feel an intense fear response. But if the context is of a young child and a toy gun, we may have a small fear response and some anger at the child, but that’s all it is.

Another example is if someone tells you that they love you. If you believe they mean it, you will feel joy, happiness. But, if you do not believe they mean it, you won’t feel joy, and maybe anger or sadness, or something in those categories.

So we feel what we believe, yet most of the time it’s completely not conscious, or it's subconscious, and that’s almost always the case.

This understanding, or discovery, is at the heart of the most common treatment in mental health, which is Cognitive Therapy. Our goal as therapists is to help people create different beliefs — quite simply to move from negative beliefs to positive beliefs. And then they move from negative emotions to positive emotions — about themselves and their lives.

For instance, quite often we help women realize that it is not their fault that their partner abuses them. Changing that fundamental cognitive belief changes how they feel about themselves, which also helps them feel stronger and more empowered to leave an abusive situation.

Finally, this understanding or discovery has important implications on the experience of fear and sadness. I will talk more about this later, but the goal is to help people not fear their fear or feel sad about their sadness. Both clinical anxiety and depression are partly that. For instance, when having a more continuous fear response, which we call anxiety, we typically believe that is a fearful situation, which causes more of a fear response.

So, a great deal more about this later, but it’s a fundamental discovery about our emotions that we feel what we believe.

VLOG | E15 | The Purpose of Emotions

Our emotions have a purpose, which are founded in our continued Existing, or Caring.

Primary emotions: Joy, Anger, Fear, Sadness.

All four emotions are normal, healthy responses.

We feel joy when someone wonderful hugs us, we feel fear if someone yells at us, we feel anger to fight back, and we feel sadness when we lose someone we love.

This tells us here’s nothing wrong with us, and how we feel.

We’re always feeling emotions, like sensing.

Our emotions are always telling us something.

Always having a purpose, part of the overall Caring that leads to our continued Existing.

VLOG | E14 | We are ALWAYS FEELING something

Now that I have explained briefly our four primary emotional responses, it’s time to understand how they work, whether in the background or the foreground.

The main point here is that we are always feeling something emotionally, even though we don’t notice it most of the time.

It’s just like we are always tasting, touching, and smelling, even though we don’t notice it most of the time.

For instance, it’s only when we have a strong taste response, like to a sour pickle, or a strong smell response, like to a fragrant flower, that we notice our taste response.

The same is true for a strong emotional response — that’s when we notice it. Like the joy of a close relationship, or the sadness of losing it.

Primary emotions and primary tastes are a good comparison. Or, our four primary emotional responses of joy, anger, fear, and sadness are just like our five primary taste responses of sweet, sour, salty, savory, and bitter.

So, we feel joy when something great happens to us, we feel fear when we get in trouble, or anger when somebody offends us. Similarly, we taste the sweetness of a chocolate bar, the saltiness of french fries, or the savoriness of a juicy steak.

But most of the time, we cannot identify what we’re feeling emotionally, or there’s not much there to notice. Again, it’s just like we’re always tasting something, but there’s not much there to notice. All of these experiences are insignificant, or are in the background. Yet it is so important to know always feeling.

This also helps us discover that we are not our emotions — they are something that we have, just like our sensory experiences.

Like I said in the previous episodes, sometimes we need to manage our emotions. Like sometimes managing joy when we’re with someone who feels sadness, like managing fear in the face of adversity, or like managing anger when we need to remain calm. Much more on that later.

But it’s important to know fundamentally that our primary emotional responses are always happening, always there, or that we’re always feeling something, whether in the background or the foreground, whether low or high in their intensity.

VLOG | E13 | Primary Emotions (JAFS) The SADNESS Response

In this final installment of the four primary emotions, we conclude with the SADNESS response. Just like joy, fear, and anger, sadness is a natural, normal, healthy, and important emotional response.

The SADNESS response is also the basis for one type of major depressive disorder, and needs to be understand understood that way, as well.

SADNESS typically occurs in response to loss, either the loss of someone special, something important, and or something that we do. We also feel SADNESS when we lack things, like when we lack joy, especially people, activities, and environments that make us happy.

Words that mean shades and strengths of the SADNESS sadness response are down, apathetic, lethargic, blue, disheartened, and stuck.

As I mentioned earlier, the SADNESS response is the basis for how and why we experience clinical depression. Later I will describe major depression more, and how there are two varieties. SADNESS is the basis for one of those.

But basically, when life situations cause us to feel sad, or cause the SADNESS response more continually, that’s what we usually call depressing. And when we feel hopeless, or hopeless that the situation will improve, this intensifies the SADNESS response, making it more feel intense and what we typically call one type of clinical depression.

Finally, and to conclude this description of the four primary response emotional responses, or joy, anger, fear, and sadness, they are all natural, normal, and healthy responses. Emotional responses exist to tell us something, just like every other sensory response. More on all of this later, a lot more.

VLOG | E12 | Primary Emotions (JAFS) The ANGER Response

Moving now to the ANGER response, it is probably the least understood emotional response. In fact, it’s probably the one we want to deny, like we don’t have it, that we should not have any anger in our lives. That is impossible, and actually not safe.

Typically, the ANGER response follows the FEAR response as in the "fight" reaction to fear, just like the flight reaction within the classic “fight-flight” reaction biologists have discussed for decades.

Seen from that point of you, the ANGER response is obviously protective, or, when under attack of any kind, one possible response is to become angry and fight off the attacker.

Typical words that mean or represent the ANGER response are mad, annoyed, disgusted, frustrated, defensive, and enraged.

Part of what we’ll talk about in future episodes is how to manage the normal and natural ANGER response, because knowing how and why it exists, will help you manage it as it occurs.

But to know that it is primary emotional response, a healthy and vital emotional response, is the beginning to managing the ANGER emotional response.

VLOG | E11 | Primary Emotions (JAFS) The FEAR Response

Last time, I talked about the JOY response, which is, biologically speaking, the approach response. Now it’s time to go through to the avoidance emotional responses, or anger, fear, and sadness.

But I want to start with the FEAR response, because the ANGER response often follows fear.

The FEAR response basically helps us know something is dangerous to us, that something may harm us. We have a fear response to someone wanting to harm us, to some bad circumstance that’s happening to us or could happen to us, and to anything that we consistently worry about. Worry is a type of fear response.

We have many words that mean the FEAR response, and they include anxious, panicked, afraid, scared, nervous, and stressed.

What’s so important about understanding the fear response, like the anger and sadness responses, is that it is equal to and as normal and healthy as the JOY response. All of our emotional responses are equally important to our survival, to healthy living, to feeling safe, secure, and happy.

Finally, the FEAR response is the basis for what we clinically call anxiety. They are the same, they are not different, and understanding the FEAR response as something normal, healthy, functional, and vital is absolutely important to understanding how to treat anxiety from a clinical perspective.

VLOG | 10 | Primary Emotions (JAFS) The JOY Response

It’s now time to explore each of the four primary emotional responses. Starting with JOY, as it is the response we seek to have and maintain the most throughout our lives.

Biologists talk about approach and avoidance as the most fundamental behavioral motivations. The JOY is response is the fundamental approach response, or we are attracted to anything and anybody that cause JOY. In contrast, we want to avoid anything or anybody that cause the other three emotional responses, or anger, fear, and sadness.

Over time, like throughout our history on this planet, we have tried to define this feeling we have called joy, happiness, content, elatedness, and so on. We have so many words to describe this feeling, or emotional response.

We can also be very critical of this response, sometimes calling it hedonistic, self-centered, or something else that is negative. Certainly that would be the case if it’s at the expense of others or harmful to others.

It’s important to understand not only the biological and psychological importance of JOY, but also to know how it is a primary emotional response.

We have many words that all mean the JOY response, and some of these are happy, blissful, ecstatic, friendly, hopeful, energized, and loving.

What’s important here is to understand that all of these words have some meaning of JOY, or some meaningful representation of the feeling of JOY. 

We need to use these words because they are descriptive, and for understanding our emotional response system. We also need to see that they all mean the same thing, and they all relate to what motivates us to pursue and maintain activities, relationships, meaningful events, and everything that is best for us.

The JOY response is what makes that happen.

VLOG | E9 | Emotional Responses are like Sensory Responses

In the last episode, I talked about understanding primary emotions as emotional responses. This week, taking that further, it’s about understanding that emotional responses are just like sensory responses.

Our sensory responses are sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch. Our sensory systems respond to what’s happening around us. As I said last time, our emotional responses are the same thing, or emotional responses to what’s going on around us and inside us.

Let’s look at one sensory response in particular that helps make the point. That is taste. We are always tasting something, and most of the time do not think about it or realize it. When there’s something that has a strong taste, we notice it. Like a sour pickle. Before we bite into it, we don’t notice that we’re tasting anything, but is soon as we do, wow, that’s sour.

Same is true for primary emotional responses. We’re going along, having feelings, not noticing them. But then we get a phone call from someone we love, we have the joy response, and love them back.

Secondly, like the taste sensory response, we have four primary emotional responses. In other words, there are five primary taste responses, or sweet, sour, salty, savory, and bitter. Similarly, there are four primary emotional responses, or joy, anger, fear, and sadness.

One of the key discoveries here is that we’re always having sensory responses, including emotional responses, but we don’t realize it. We are always tasting, seeing, smelling, and so on. Similarly, we are always having feelings, or emotional responses, and most of the time we do not notice them.

Or, when something happens that causes a noticeable response, like a strong smell or taste, we notice it. Similarly, when something happens that causes a noticeable emotional response, like something that causes great sadness or joy, we notice it.

We are always sensing, we are always feeling, and it’s part of our Caring being, part of Existing. Everything about our living being is Caring, and emotional responses, or all sensory responses, are Caring.

VLOG | E8 | Primary Emotions are Emotional Responses

Last week, I introduced the idea of primary emotions, or the emotional families of joy, anger, fear, and sadness. This week, it’s about understanding those primary emotions as emotional responses.

Emotional responses are responses to what’s going on either around us or inside us. When something happens, we have an emotional response, in one of those four categories.

It’s just like any one of our sensory responses, of sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch. Our sensory systems respond to what’s happening around us. When there is a hot apple pie in front of us, we both see it and smell it. We taste it when we take a bite, and we feel it as it travels down to our stomach. It’s a total sensory experience. 

The same is true for our emotional response system. When we sit down to eat that apple pie with someone we love, we feel the joy response of spending time with them. If someone were to stop by and take the apple pie from us, we may feel the anger response. If we lose that person we love, we would feel the sadness response from the loss. If that someone we love fell ill, we would feel the fear response that something could harm them.

The major point here is that all emotions that we feel are not only in the four categories of joy, anger, fear, and sadness, but they are always a response to what’s happening around us or inside us.

Inherent to this understanding is that emotions are not states of being, but always responses. Clinically speaking, that means anxiety is not a state of being, but a high or consuming fear response. Depression is not a state of being, but a high or consuming sadness response. I will spend a lot of time on this channel explaining all of this, or clinical experiences of anxiety and depression.

The next four episodes on this channel will be further explorations of each major emotional response, what that is like, and our typical experience of it. That will form the backbone of understanding not only our emotions, but also our relational experiences, and our clinically defined experiences, like anxiety and depression, which are remarkably treatable from this perspective.

VLOG | E7 | Existing, Caring, and Primary Relationships

Beginning with the discoveries of existing, caring, and everything about us as caring — from our head to our toes — that includes our emotions.

Our sensory systems serve a purpose to tell us something, like something is hot or cold, smells good or bad, tastes delicious or awful, and so on. Emotions work the same way, or emotions are responses to what’s happening around us and in our minds, serving a purpose to give us a sense of what is good for us or not good for us, another caring feature of our caring, living being.

Keep that in mind as I talk about what I have have observed clinically for the past couple of decades.

I have noticed that we all seem to experience four basic emotions over time. They are wellness, or feeling well, happy, contented; depressed, or feeling down or empty; anxious, or experiencing overwhelming anxiety and fear; and anger, or irritability, grumpiness, highly annoyed. And basically, that breaks down to four primary emotions, or joy, anger, fear, and sadness.

Remarkably, one day I ran across an article about research at the University of Glasgow in Scotland. The researchers identified four primary emotional expressions, or facial expressions. And remarkably, they matched the four that I saw clinically, or joy, anger, fear, and sadness.

Not only is this the basis of how I approach clinical work with my patients now, it also tells us a great deal about ourselves, and about how our emotional systems are part of the caring system that is life-sustaining for us.

Emotions exist because they serve a purpose for us, are life-sustaining, or caring, enabling us and many other animals to continue existing, and this topic will be another key aspect of this channel going forward.

VLOG | E6 | Existing, Caring, Loving, and Relationships

Adding to last week’s episode, this episode is how loving relationships are best for our mental health and overall well-being.

Put simply, evolution shaped our need for relationships. Obviously, this does not mean bad or toxic relationships, but good and mutually caring relationships.

Again, in terms of existing, or actively existing/caring, the need to have and maintain positive and loving relationships is essential for our survival as a species, or actively existing into the future.

The main point here is to explain that loving relationships are literally essential, not just something that are good and enjoyable. We all have the equal need and capacity for loving relationships, shaped by evolution, for our continued existing. It’s that simple, and it’s also that grand.

In terms of how evolution shapes relationships, my favorite example are two of the big cats in the world. Because of environmental conditions, lions evolved to rely heavily on mutually caring relationships. They live in large groups, called prides. Another equally large cat in the world, tigers, evolved to live fundamentally alone, living together in relationships briefly for mating purposes, and for raising their young.

The purpose of this episode is to show that mutually caring relationships, or loving relationships, exist for a reason, shaped by evolution, for our continued existing. It’s as simple as that, but as grand as that in terms of the feeling it gives us. It’s the emotional glue of being together and living together.

And that’s why it’s best and essential for our mental health — that’s why mutually caring and loving relationships provide and create our best mental health. Because it’s that important for our continued existing.

VLOG | E5 | Existing, Caring, and Loving

Today’s episode is the about direct line between universal existing and the love we share together.

Everything in the universe is existing, interacting fields of energy, merging and emerging. Atoms emerge from the fundamental fields of energy, molecules emerge from atoms, and eventually living beings emerge from molecules.

As I have stated, all living beings are Caring. Everything about living beings, every aspect and every function, is Caring. For us, digestion is Caring, feeling pain is Caring, our beating heart is Caring -- everything is Caring.

Many animals, or mammals, actually feel something that is Caring, an emotional affection, a bond or bonding, that we call love.

This emotional connection is essential for our survival, or continued existing. That’s why it exists. Not for any other reason except it’s function, shaped by evolution, over time, for our continued existing.

The universe doesn’t care, it never will, and it never should. But we do, we need to care for and about each other for our continued existing, and feeling that is what leads ultimately to our best and essential mental health, something we will explore together many, many times on this channel.